


Courage is Exhausting

by talefeathers



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Bittersweet, Character Study, Fluff, Gen, I Know the Rituals Are Intricate, Missing Scene, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Relationship Study, Sleepiness, platonic intimacy, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 12:07:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29207076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/talefeathers/pseuds/talefeathers
Summary: After a full day's journey to Brokilon, Jaskier wearily tries to update Geralt on all that's happened while he's been on the mend. Geralt lets him rest.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 4
Kudos: 23





	Courage is Exhausting

**Author's Note:**

> "The fatigue caused by the daylong journey had made itself felt. [Jaskier] awoke and realised he had probably fallen asleep during the story, dropping off mid-sentence. He shifted and almost rolled off the pile of branches. Geralt was no longer lying beside him on the makeshift bed." — _The Time of Contempt_ by Andrzej Sapkowski

Jaskier had been talking of war and of treachery for over an hour before Geralt realized, with a guilty pang, how weary the bard looked. He was blinking slowly into the glowing twist of moss the dryad Fauve had left for them to see by, and stumbling over his words in a fashion most unlike him as he sat beside Geralt on the makeshift bed the witcher had fashioned.

And it was no wonder. Even excluding the full day’s ride he had taken to get here, to sing at the edge of Brokilon Forest, where it was known that the dryads shot first and asked questions later, in the daft hope that they would hear him and be stayed…

_ Must have taken all the courage in the poor devil’s body, _ Geralt thought, watching as the bard’s head began to droop despite clear efforts to keep it from doing so. Geralt shifted so that, should this downward slump continue, Jaskier’s head would land on his shoulder and not on the ground.  _ And courage is exhausting. _

“It’s said that Tissaia,” Jaskier murmured. “I heard that Tissaia de Vries…”

But the sentence went unfinished. His eyes slipped shut, and his head finished its journey down onto Geralt’s shoulder.

Geralt let him stay like that for some time, waiting until he could hear, in his breathing and in his heartbeat, that the bard was truly and deeply asleep before moving to carefully lower him onto the bed of branches.

“I asked too much of you,” Geralt murmured, positioning Jaskier’s hat to act as a pillow beneath his head. “I’m sorry, old friend.”

He sat down on the branches beside him with his arms draped over his knees, and for a long while there was silence but for the distant whisper of the Ribbon, the low murmuring of the dryads in their camp, and the rustle of wind through the trees.

Geralt was dozing himself, watching the rise and fall of his sleeping friend’s chest, when a thought blinked through his mind, unprompted:  _ How young he still is.  _ A tightness curled into his chest.  _ Decades I’ve known him, and still he’s so young. _

He hesitated for a moment, sure that such maudlin thoughts were a sign that he should just go to sleep. Then he placed a heavy, calloused hand atop Jaskier’s head. Gently, so as not to wake him.

“I am glad you’re here, Jaskier,” Geralt whispered. “I meant that when I said it, you know. I am glad you’ve come.”

Then the witcher lay down with his back to the bard and fell into a fitful, troubled sleep.


End file.
